PARK THE POT WHILE YOU'RE ON THE ROAD

In mid-February, the Federal government re-tabled former Prime Minister Jean
Chretien's controversial marijuana decriminalization bill. The bill will
make pot far from legal, but it will allow personal possession of small
amounts to be punishable by a fine and no longer result in a criminal
record. This is great news for many people who believe the current laws to
be unjustly oppressive; a lot of people will burn one down if this bill
actually gets passed, and I hope it does-in my opinion, weed just carries a
bad rap. Hey, it's no better or worse than booze and our government makes
sure we can get that on almost every corner. This is Alberta, after all-we
practically grow liquor stores as a crop.

Critics fear that decriminalization will result in greater consumption and
lead to increased drug addiction. However, as counterintuitive as it might
seem, the new legislation on marijuana hopes not only to curb the usage of
the drug, but also lessen extraneous social hardships involved, the logic
being that by decriminalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana, the
30 000-plus people charged every year here in Canada will no longer have to
shoulder the burden of court, potential jail time and a criminal record that
will follow them the rest of their lives.

Further benefits to decriminalization are that much of the monetary
resources currently allocated to policing-like arrests and costly judiciary
court proceedings-can be redirected to social support and drug
rehabilitation programs for those in need. Personally, I think this sounds
like a much more civilized and effective way of dealing with the so-called
problem.

Now, only time will tell whether this proposed plan of attack will work or
not. And although I support the decriminalization bill, I still hold some
major concerns. I think that initially, and maybe even permanently,
marijuana use in Canada will increase. With that in mind, I think that we
can all agree that there should be better methods of testing for marijuana
use in the workplace and especially where the potential for driving under
the influence is concerned.

As it is right now, I think most people would feel that getting behind the
wheel of a car baked is dangerous, but I happen to know that it occurs way
too often. I mean, one of the most popular ways to get high is hotboxing a
car. And I don't know about you, but I don't want people driving around
stoned anymore than I want drunk people doing it.

I think this is something that should have been addressed a long time ago. I
hope that with the passing of the decriminalization act, that government and
law enforcement agencies will be placed in a position where they will take
this more seriously and start to increase public awareness that driving
stoned is no better than driving drunk. Hotbox if that's your thing, but
keep the car in the driveway.